It really is coincidence that I returned to Saigon just as Donald Trump arrived in my hometown to visit one of his golf courses.
On the plus side, I got to run my first hash in 4 weeks. As is often the case in the rainy season, the omens weren’t great. Quite a bit of rain in the morning but of course it is so localised that it has very little bearing on the actual hash route. And so it transpired.
The usual pick up at the Caravelle with both Gobblin’ King and Team Jack Off holding up the bus by being late. Otherwise an uneventful trip out to our club house at the residence of Non Stop Cock and Cemen Trader who, along with Iron Dildo and Just Mai, were our hares for the day.
We teed off with an easy start along a surfaced road and then after a few minutes a shout of, On On, from behind advised that the route had cunningly split off to the left. This was a tell-tale sign that should have, and of course wasn’t, heeded as the same thing happened again several times during the run. We were soon in the rough, amongst plantations that our hare explained were yellow mai flowers that are expected to be ready in time for Tet next year.
Lots of running through the plant bushes and around the edges of paddies, along canals and over bridges. Some serious, shiggy sections with more ditch jumping than for a long time (more on this later). The majority of the pack were then found out of bounds as they short-cutted through the fields.
At around 6.5km we had a wonderful, al fresco beer stop with strange plastic sachets of cold, flavoured milk in addition to the usual offers of cold beer. Just a quick, relatively straight-forward back 9 to the end, where we holed out at 9km with one of the best runs of the year so far. You can use you own judgement to decide how complementary that is.
Back at the 19th hole, the circle involved special mention of Cemen Trader, Cherry Ho and Chemically Castrated for reaching landmark numbers. Several misdemeanours were dealt with, icings were handed out to the guiltiest culprits and finally, we had a naming for Just Mai. A few suggestions were bandied about before we settled on, “Jump On It”. Very appropriate considering the amount of jumping around that took place on the run. The only other thing to note was that we only had one walker with everyone else making the cut for the run. Great to see.
All in all, a hash well above par with a few strokes, lots of time spent in the rough, the odd lip out*, a bit of green play and, thankfully, not too many bogeys.
I might have missed The Donald but it’s a small price to pay for such an epic hash. Well done to all who made it possible.
On On,
Cock-a-leaky
*A lip out – a golfing term used to describe a situation where the ball runs tantalisingly along the rim without entering the hole